for thought

Found this quote in a gem from 1962; “A Private and Public Faith”, by William Stringfellow (love that name!)

“The religious suppose that only the religious know about God or care about God, and that God cares only for the religious. Characteristically, religion is precious and possessive toward God, and institutes and conducts itself as if God really needs religion, as if His existence depends on the recognition of religion. Religion considers that God is a secret disclosed only in the discipline and practice of religion. But all this is most offensive to the Word of God. The best news of God is that He is no secret. The news of God embodied in Jesus Christ is that God is openly and notoriously active in the world. In this news the Christian Church is constituted; it is this news which the Christian Church exists to spread…The Church, unlike any religion, exists to present to the world and to celebrate in the world, and on behalf of the world, God’s presence and power and utterance and action in the on-going life of the world.”


also: http://www.theforgottenways.org/blog/2006/11/04/the-subversion-of-christianity/

Christianity claims not to be a religion that is superior to others, but to be an antireligion that refutes all the religions that link us with a divine universe. No doubt Christianity constantly becomes a religion…The Christian religion itself is constantly called into question by the absolute that is revealed in Jesus Christ.” - Jacques Ellul, The Subversion of Christianity